<p>Hey everyone, so I got admitted to caltech class of 2015, and am getting pretty paranoid about surviving caltech as an electrical engineer. What bothers me the most is that my AMC 12 scores, which are supposed to measure problem solving ability, were not that high. I got a 97.5 on my last amc 12 this year, barely able to qualify for the aime, and that was with 3 weeks of doing aops problems. SAT scores are good, but i don't think SAT scores measure intelligence as much as the amc does...</p>
<p>do most people develop good problem solving abilities at caltech, or come in really strong already. How do people who haven't won any math competitions do?</p>
<p>I hope Caltech doesn’t require being good at the AMC. I’ve never qualified for the AIME… XD</p>
<p>But to be serious, if you (or anyone) got into Caltech, then admissions knows you have “the right stuff” to do well there. Everyone going into Caltech has good problem solving skills (including you and me!) but Caltech forces you to develop those skills even more.</p>
<p>It is very manageable - many folk here had no opportunity to take the AIME or AMC - some school districts offer it and some don’t. Caltech realizes that not everyone has the same background coming in, and to help with that they have NO grades for the first two terms. Everyone has an adjustment to college, and to being away from home, and to the academic standards. The first two terms are to bring everyone up to the standard that Caltech expects. So, they give you plenty of time to adjust. Even after the first two terms, everyone works together in study groups, which helps tremendously in understanding the material. There is an amazing feel of cooperation and collaboration here because of that.</p>
<p>I can promise you that your score on the AMC will have very little bearing on how well you can handle EE at Caltech. If you want to prepare yourself for Caltech EE, you might find going without sleep a better skill than doing well on math exams ;)</p>